The University at Albany has one thing going for the basketball team. The America East Tournament will be played on the Great Danes' campus next month. That's good for the Danes because they can't seem to beat anyone in the league away from the familiar confines of SEFCU Arena.

UAlbany saw its America East road record tumble to 1-4 as the Danes dropped a 67-54 decision to Hartford in front of 2,230 at Chase Family Arena Saturday night.

With the loss, the Danes slip to 6-5 in the league (12-12 overall). At home, UAlbany is 5-1 in league games. Hartford improves to 5-5 in the league and 8-15 overall.

"I don't know," UAlbany coach Will Brown said. "Maybe our guys saw the Hawk suit (Hartford mascot) and got nervous. This team is just Jekyll and Hyde. I don't know which team is going to show up from day to day on the road."

UAlbany has looked very ordinary, and in some cases, worse than that, in its America East road efforts. UAlbany lost at UMass-Lowell and New Hampshire (although New Hampshire upset Stony Brook, which is tied for first place with Vermont, on the road Saturday).

At home, the Danes were the first America East team to beat Stony Brook; the only home loss came against Vermont.

Going into Saturday's game, the Danes had won six straight over Hartford. And, of course, UAlbany whipped the Hawks 81-56 at home on Jan. 4. In that game, the Danes made a school record 16 3-point shots. Brown didn't expect that kind of shooting again. But, he probably didn't expect the Hawks to bury 12 shots from 3-point range.

"Every couple of games, they do this," Brown said about Hartford. "They bang threes, and you just hope they don't to it against you. We did not play our best game, but Hartford had something to do with that."

Hartford coach John Gallagher said he did not have to use the first game as motivation for his team. And he was hoping he would not have to.

"The last thing I said before we went out of the locker room was that to be special, you should not be motivated by external things," he said. "I didn't mention it (first Albany game) once. If you don't know it, you should not be a competitor."

A layup by UAlbany's Gary Johnson 10 seconds into the second half tied the game at 28, but that was as close as the Danes could come. Hartford took the lead for good on a basket by Mark Nwakamma, who sat the last two games with a leg injury. Nwakamma, who leads Hartford in scoring (14.9 ppg) and rebounding (5.8 rpg), scored 14 points, as did Taylor Dyson, who made four of five 3-pointers.